Konica Minolta Business Technologies, Inc.

Konica Minolta, Inc.

Satoru Shibuya

Hidetoshi Noguchi

Kazuyoshi Hara

Takahiro Kuroda

Hideo Yamaki

Yasunori Nakayama

Hisashi Murata

Yasuo Tanaka

Tomohide Mori

Hideji Higashimura

Yusuke Nishisaka

Takahiro Kudora

An image forming method includes: providing an active light curable ink on a surface of an intermediate transfer body; irradiating the active light curable ink provided on the surface of the intermediate transfer body with first active light; and transferring the active light curable ink to a recording medium, wherein the wavelength of the first active light is a wavelength that causes the transmittance of the intermediate transfer body to be 70% or more, and causes the absorbance of the active light curable ink to be 0.01 or more.

Image forming method and image forming apparatus

An image forming apparatus includes a member arranged in contact with or in proximity to an image carrier, a sensor for measuring an electrical characteristic value of the member, a power supply which switches from a first mode in which one of a constant current and a constant voltage is applied to the member to a second mode in which the other is applied to the member, a storage which stores first correspondence between an amount of use of the member in the first mode and the electrical characteristic value, and a hardware processor. The hardware processor obtains second correspondence between the electrical characteristic value measured with the sensor and the amount of use of the member in the first mode and predicts a serviceable period of the member when the power supply is switched to the second mode based on the first and the second correspondences.

Image forming apparatus, non-transitory computer-readable recording medium having program stored thereon, and server

An image forming apparatus provided with a conductive member to form an image on a sheet using a toner includes: a voltage acquisition portion configured to acquire a biased voltage value as a voltage value by applying a bias to the conductive member; an environment sensor configured to output an environment condition measurement value representing an internal environment condition; and a hardware processor configured to transform the biased voltage value acquired by the voltage acquisition portion into a virtual voltage value appearing in the conductive member as the biased voltage value under a standard environment condition, in which the environment condition has a predetermined standard condition, on the basis of the environment condition measurement value output from the environment sensor, and determine a service life of the conductive member on the basis of the virtual voltage value.

Image forming apparatus, conductive member service life determination method, and conductive member service life determination program

Provided is an image forming apparatus capable of estimating lives of components more accurately than before. The image forming apparatus includes an ion conductive component, and a processor for estimating a life of the conductive component. The processor acquires an index value related to energization of the conductive component, and estimates the life of the conductive component based on the index value per unit time.

Image forming apparatus capable of estimating life of ion conductive component and method for estimating life of ion conductive component

An image forming apparatus includes an image carrier, a transfer member, a measurement instrument, and a controller. The controller is configured to predict a lifetime of the transfer member based on first and second electrical states. The first electrical state is an electrical state of the transfer member when a first image carrier is attached as the image carrier. The second electrical state is an electrical state of the transfer member when a second image carrier different from the first image carrier is attached as the image carrier after formation of an image with the use of the first image carrier.

Image forming apparatus and lifetime prediction method

An image forming device that forms an image by transferring a toner image formed by developing an electrostatic latent image formed on a photoreceptor from the photoreceptor to an intermediate transfer body by applying a transfer bias to a transfer member and putting the transfer member in contact with the intermediate transfer body. The device includes: a current supplier selectively supplying a first constant current and a second constant current to the transfer member; a first voltage acquirer acquiring a first voltage occurring between the transfer member and the intermediate transfer body while the transfer member is supplied with the first constant current; a second voltage acquirer acquiring a second voltage occurring between the transfer member and the photoreceptor while the transfer member is supplied with the second constant current; and a thickness acquirer acquiring a value indicating photoreceptor layer thickness of the photoreceptor by using the first and second voltages.

Image forming device and method of acquiring photoreceptor layer thickness

An image forming apparatus has an image carrier that carries a toner image; a transfer member that is opposed to the image carrier, a transfer voltage being applied to the transfer member so that the toner image is transferred from the image carrier to a print medium passing between the transfer member and the image carrier; a first voltage application device that applies the transfer voltage to the transfer member; a separation member to which a separation voltage is applied so that the print medium is separated from the image carrier; a second voltage application device that applies the separation voltage to the separation member; a sensing device that senses an image density of the toner image; and a control section that controls a magnitude of the separation voltage based upon the image density of the toner image.

Image forming apparatus with controlled separation voltage and transfer voltage

An image forming apparatus includes an image carrier to carry a toner image. A transfer unit transfers the toner image to a sheet. A fixing unit fixes the toner image on the sheet. The sheet with the image is discharged to a sheet discharge tray. A circular conveyance path turns over the sheet past the transfer unit and the fixing unit and passes the sheet through the transfer unit and the fixing unit again. A heat amount setting section sets an amount of heat applied by the fixing unit when fixing of the sheet is executed. In duplex printing, a first heat amount for fixing the toner image on a first side of the sheet is smaller than a reference heat amount for simplex printing whereas a second heat amount for fixing the toner image on a second side of the sheet is larger than the reference heat amount.

Image forming apparatus with different fixing temperatures for each side in duplex fixing

An image forming apparatus includes an image carrier configured to carry a toner image. A transfer unit is configured to transfer the toner image on the image carrier onto a recording sheet. A fixing unit is configured to fix the toner image transferred at the transfer unit onto the recording sheet. Through a conveyance path, the recording sheet is conveyed from the transfer unit to the fixing unit. A conveyance guide member is disposed in the conveyance path on an image formation surface side of the recording sheet. A fan is configured to send air from the transfer unit to the conveyance path toward a gap defined between the conveyance guide member and the transfer unit so as to form a flow of air in the conveyance path from an upstream side to a downstream side in a conveyance direction of the recording sheet.

Image forming apparatus including fan to generate air flow in conveyance path in sheet conveyance direction

An image forming apparatus having: an image support that supports a toner image; a transfer member adapted to sandwich with the transfer member and the image support; a voltage application unit that applies a transfer bias voltage to the transfer member; a current detecting unit that detects transfer current flowing from the voltage application unit to the transfer material after transfer processing on the transfer material starts; and a control unit that sets an upper limit of transfer current on the basis of a value of the transfer current detected by the current detecting unit, and thereafter further acquires a transfer current value from the current detecting unit to control a transfer bias voltage generated by the voltage application unit, such that the transfer current value during transfer does not exceed the upper limit.

Image forming apparatus having transfer bias control

An image forming apparatus having: a toner image carrier; a transfer member; a transfer voltage applying device which applies a bias voltage to the transfer member; a voltage controller which performs constant voltage control on the transfer voltage applying device; a transfer contribution current detecting device; an antistatic member for removing static electricity from the record medium after transfer of a toner image; and an antistatic voltage applying device which applies an AC voltage to the antistatic member. The transfer contribution current detecting device measures current values during a current detection time, which corresponds to an integral multiple of a period of the AC voltage applied to the antistatic member, and detects a transfer contribution current value from the measured values, and the voltage controller controls the bias voltage applied to the transfer member based on the transfer contribution current value.

Image forming apparatus

Brush rollers rotate in a direction indicated by an arrow while being in contact with an image formation surface to remove toner remaining on the image formation surface from an intermediate transfer belt. The brush rollers each mainly include a rotational shaft and a brush. The brush rollers face the intermediate transfer belt with brush winding directions being opposite from one another. The brush rollers rotate in the direction indicated by the arrow. Thus, seams of the brush rollers can be prevented from being in contact with the same portion on the image formation surface of the intermediate transfer belt.

An image forming apparatus includes an image carrier to carry a toner image; a driving unit to drive the image carrier to rotate; a transfer unit to transfer the toner image at a transfer position; a cleaner at a cleaning position to remove toner remaining on the image carrier after transfer; an obtaining unit to obtain information indicating a likelihood of the remaining toner adhering to the image carrier; a judging unit to judge whether or not the likelihood is equal to or lower than a predetermined value; and a controller to control the driving unit (i) to stop driving the image carrier before a rear end of an area of the image carrier on which the toner remains reaches the cleaning position, when the judging unit judges affirmatively, and, (ii) to stop driving the image carrier after the cleaner removes the remaining toner, when the judging unit judges negatively.

Image forming apparatus and method for stopping driving image carrier

An image forming apparatus having an image carrier that carries a toner image; an opposed member that is provided so as to be opposed to the image carrier; an application device that applies a bias to the opposed member; and a control device that controls the application device to apply a first bias and thereafter a second bias to the opposed member so as to remove toner from the opposed member. The first bias has an absolute value that is large enough to cause discharge from the opposed member into air. The second bias has an absolute value that is too small to cause discharge from the opposed member into the air, and has a reverse polarity to the first bias.

An image forming apparatus is for transferring a toner image on an image carrier onto a transfer medium, and thermally fixing the toner image by a fixing device, and comprises a cleaner removing residual toner on the image carrier. The apparatus: acquires information relating to a distribution of a density of the residual toner at each position within a section on the image carrier at an end of an image forming job, the section extending from the transfer position to immediately before a cleaning position; determines, based on the information, whether or not the density of the residual toner at the transfer position exceeds a corresponding threshold density pertaining to occurrence of fusion of the residual toner; and causes, if determining negatively, the drive unit to stop when the image forming job is completed and the residual toner at the transfer position reaches a predetermined position within the section.

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Chiryu, Japan

Satoru Shibuya